Helping kids understand other religions

It is so hard to talk to your children about God and then it’s even harder to talk them about other people and why they believe in God differently and why they practice a religion differently. It sort of multiplies the problem. And I love the name of kids in the house, because I think house is the best metaphor. In a house, you’ve got a front door, a back door, a side door, a doggy door – you have all these doors that lead into the central place, usually the kitchen – that’s where it was for me. But no matter what door you come in, you always arrive at the same place. So that’s what I tell my children – people practice religions, they think about God differently, but we’re all ending up in the kitchen. We’re just coming through different doors.

Rabbi Sherre Hirsch

Rabbi & Relationship Expert

Rabbi Sherre Hirsch is a mother of four, author, speaker, TV personality, teacher and the spiritual life consultant for Canyon Ranch. After eight years at Sinai Temple in Los Angeles, she stepped out from behind the formal podium to share her message in all kinds of pulpits from The Today Show to a small baptist church in Alabama. She published her first book, We Plan, God Laughs: What to Do When Life Hits You Over the Head in 2008; her second book will be published in early 2013. Rabbi Hirsch spends her free time practicing yoga, baking brownies and playing freeze dance with her husband and children.

It is so hard to talk to your children about God and then it’s even harder to talk them about other people and why they believe in God differently and why they practice a religion differently. It sort of multiplies the problem. And I love the name of kids in the house, because I think house is the best metaphor. In a house, you’ve got a front door, a back door, a side door, a doggy door – you have all these doors that lead into the central place, usually the kitchen – that’s where it was for me. But no matter what door you come in, you always arrive at the same place. So that’s what I tell my children – people practice religions, they think about God differently, but we’re all ending up in the kitchen. We’re just coming through different doors.